In 1992, Jennifer Clarice Johnson was convicted in Florida of delivering a controlled substance to an infant after she admitted to using drugs within 24 hours before giving birth. She appealed the decision and the Supreme Court of Florida overturned her conviction.

The court found the law prohibiting delivery of a controlled substance to a minor did not apply to mothers who delivered drug-addicted babies because that was not the Legislature's intent when enacting the law. The court also held that these prosecutions violate public policy because they could discourage women from seeking prenatal care.

California's courts will soon hear this challenge:

In October 2003, a California woman was sentenced to life in prison after her 3-month-old son ingested a lethal amount of methamphetamine from her breast milk.

The Supreme Court has not yet agreed to hear a challenge to the cases:

The U.S. Supreme Court recently declined to hear an appeal from South Carolina involving a 26-year-old woman with a "below average/borderline deficiency" IQ who admitted to frequent cocaine use during a pregnancy that resulted in stillbirth. She was sentenced to 20 years in prison.

Grumpy Forrester says:

While we would hope that no woman would put her unborn child at risk through reckless and stupid drug use, we should also hope that the support and assistance of the medical community can be used to help her break the drug use cycle for the sake of her child, and not become simply a tool for the use of an aggressive District Attorney's office that may be operating with an eye toward something other than simple jurisprudence....